The present invention generally pertains to a toe piece of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,380,749 to Georges P. J. Salomon. Toe pieces of the type disclosed in the aforementioned patent have long been known, but have not met with particular success in the market place. A problem with such designs is that the swivel arm (referred to as a short link in the patent) is operable to bear against a stop in a direction which is opposite to the movement of the ski. As a result, the compression spring which biased the swivel arm is affected by the force applied to the soleholder by the boot. In other words, a force by the boot acting toward the tip end of the ski along the longitudinal axis of the ski will force the swivel arm or link away from the stop. Inasmuch as this longitudinal force will influence the resistance to a lateral release of the boot, such a design does not comply with ideal safety standards. Variations of such designs have been proposed in which the spring is relieved from the clamping pressure. Such designs cannot be actually used, however, because they do not meet the requirements arising during skiing and may even prevent operation of the safety release. In any event, the resistance to release in such devices has an excessive variation, which probably accounts for why such toe units have not found widespread market acceptance.
It has been suggested to provide toe pieces which have a shell-like or cup-like soleholder wherein the soleholder will not move toward the tip end of the ski (within the so called elastic zone) during an outward lateral movement of the boot (see e.g., German Application Nos. 1917117 and 1964306). These applications show structures wherein a displacement toward the skiing boot is initially superimposed on the rotational movement of the soleholder. These designs however generally include a large number of parts and have intricate and delicate structures, and therefore are more likely to be damaged in actual use.
The present invention overcomes these and other problems and provides a toe piece of the type described above which does not move toward the tip of the ski within the so called elastic zone and which is comprised of relatively few moving parts.